Posts by Rich Lock
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On the PAS System front page at the moment, there are adjacent threads, with the following titles:
'People take drugs'
'Some lines for Labour' -
Hard News: People Take Drugs, in reply to BenWilson,
Do they actually appeal to the same people?
People like to get their consciousness altered. Some more than others, and some to the point of harm to themselves and those around them, either directly or indirectly. I don't think it really matters how. It's like wack-a-mole - choke off one illegal high, and another one will pop up.
I certainly knew a lot of people back in the day who would happily switch or even mix stuff that would take you up with stuff meant to take you down.
Nothing productive will happen in the way of policy until those in charge actually acknowledge the very simple fact that people like to get fucked up.
Edit: and, I will add, get very, very inventive about how they do it. No amount of legislation will change that.
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Hard News: Some Lines for Labour, in reply to Matthew Poole,
as espoused in a recent RNZ interview that I was listening to in the gym
Interesting workout strategy - I might try it.
Listening to National politicians being interviewed would probably get me angry enough to be worth an extra 10kg on the bench press. Graaaahhh! Hulk...Smash!!!
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what the hell is the DEA doing in Afghanistan???
90% of the world's poppies for heroin production are grown there, so under the current mindset of western governments, it's logical for them to be there - a key (but extremely ill-thought out) plank of the current UK intervention there was to eradicate opium poppy production and stop the flow of heroin into British cities.
However, for a snapshot of exactly how pointlessly destructive that particular mindset can be, I recommend James Fergusson's 'A million bullets'.
The British army's attempts to eradicate what was effectively the sole livelihood of farmers in Helmand province ends more or less exactly how you would expect it to end.
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Would now be a good time to recommend Ben Goldacre's Bad Science?
If memory serves, he takes quite some pains in Chapter 6 to point out that the supplement industry and associated alternative medicines are, for the most part, Big Pharma themselves. With, in many cases, supplement companies wholly or partly owned by GSK, AstraZenaca, Merck, Bayer, etc.
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Hard News: Some Lines for Labour, in reply to Bart Janssen,
Of course we could just switch to benevolent dictatorship.
I for one welcome whoever our benevolent overlords are this time.
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Hard News: Heads up for music, in reply to Danielle,
You don't listen to anything recorded before 1975?
So no real need to listen to anything before year zero, eh? :)
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Up Front: First, Come to Your Conclusion, in reply to Craig Ranapia,
like anything else, there are exceptions that prove the rule.
My personal favourite would be the entire 'Flashman' series - take the villain from 'Tom Brown's Schooldays' and spin him out into his own hugely sucessful, original, and painstakingly historically accurate series.
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There are reports, such as this one in the NY Times, and this one in the ABA Journal, that the US had 'a team of lawyers, translators and interrogators on stand-by in case Osama bin Laden was captured alive'.
The NY Times story notes that White House officials: "acknowledged that the mission always was weighted toward killing, given the possibility that Bin Laden would be armed or wearing an explosive vest."
However, if true, this story does suggest that 'the mission' wasn't purely intended as an assassination.
Although it could all just be a cunning double-bluff.
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Hard News: Asking for a Contribution, in reply to Danielle,
A belated and tiny contribution sent your way this morning.